Love of the Land: Tough love for Israel? Imposed Solution? The Ignorant Arrogance of the Advice-Givers

Tough love for Israel? Imposed Solution? The Ignorant Arrogance of the Advice-Givers

Barry Rubin

The Rubin Report

07 September 09

One remarkable thing about watching the Middle East is how what’s celebrated as brilliant in Europe or America is errant nonsense.

Writing such stuff makes people successful and gives them an audience of millions. It is so ridiculous that one wants to laugh, while so totally acceptable in Washington and European capitals that the laugher would be laughed at.

The article to which I refer is by Jacob Weisberg in the June 22 Newsweek, entitled, “A Friend in Need: Barack gets tough on Bibi.” It is far more terrible because Weisberg is neither leftist nor anti-Israel but has simply imbibed what “everyone says.”

Let me quickly add that while I don’t know Weisberg personally, I’m confident in saying he has no serious training in the Middle East, speaks neither Arabic nor Hebrew, spends little time researching the region, and has no real qualification for making the judgments he does.

Here's the theme: Israelis are so stupid about their country, situation, and region on life-and-death issues which they deal with daily that they must be saved in spite of themselves by people who have no knowledge or experience on any of these things. No other country in the world is so frequently told this kind of thing which I hear all the time from Europeans, too.

Is it so hard to comprehend that our views and behavior are based on years of experience and study? That we know best how to save ourselves and have been doing a far better job of it, against tremendous odds and unhelpful kibbitzers,than many others? That heeding their prescriptions would be disastrous, in fact have already proven so? After all, the tragic history of the last 20 years has largely resulted from listening to the same advice he gives now,

When one tries to explain these things in conversations, however, you can see their eyes go blank and their ears close up.

Weisberg’s article follows this pattern. The United States, he says (and these are main elements in the rhetoric among supporters of the Obama administration and several European governments) must show Israel “tough love,” lean “harder on Jews and the Arabs to get serious about a deal,” and stop “fostering Israeli illusions that there [is] an alternative to trading land for peace.”

All three of these arguments are based on false premises.

Tough love: This derives from the late 1980s and early 1990s when the left side of the Israeli spectrum was pushing the land-for-peace and negotiate with the PLO arguments against their rivals on the right. A little U.S. pressure, they argued, would help get talks going.

A lot has happened since then, however, notably the 1992-2000 Oslo process. This proved to the vast majority of Israelis that the Palestinian leadership (and Syria, too, for that matter) wasn’t ready or interested in peace. Disillusioned, a lot of these people supported Ariel Sharon and the disengagement from the Gaza Strip, the results of which (Hamas takeover, rocket fire) made them even more disenchanted.

That’s why the Labour party—which invented the land-for-peace argument in the first place and made the Oslo agreement and offered a two-state solution in 2000—is now in a coalition government with the Likud party. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not a “right-wing” or “hard-line” leader but someone who speaks for the national consensus, a consensus based on education through painful, bloody experience.

Israel also faces a more hostile Europe, an Iran racing toward nuclear weapons, an intransigent and incompetent Palestinian Authority, plus Hamas and Hizballah.

Today the last thing Israelis need or want is pressure to make more concessions to the Palestinians. They’ve already made a lot; these didn’t lead anywhere good. What Israel needs today is not “tough love” but real support.

Push “harder on Jews and the Arabs to get serious about a deal”: The false assumption here is that getting an agreement, any agreement, is a desperate need of the two sides and of the region as a whole.

In fact, Israel is doing very well without any comprehensive peace agreement. The economy is doing fine; morale is high; security improved. Moreover, this concept pays no attention to the idea that a deal can be a bad one, inherently instable and leading to more violence.

It never enters the minds of these people that a “peace” agreement that was broken or had dangerous provisions (giving up strategic territory; east Jerusalem; empowering a radical regime in a next-door Palestinian state; opening the door to foreign Arab or Iranian armies entering; bringing in millions of Palestinian Arabs to Israel) could leave Israel far worse off.

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Love of the Land: Tough love for Israel? Imposed Solution? The Ignorant Arrogance of the Advice-Givers

Love of the Land: Putting First Things First-Sovling The Arab Refugee Problem

Putting First Things First-Sovling The Arab Refugee Problem

Rael Jean Isaac and Ruth King
Mideast Outpost
September 09

Editors Note: In the September 2003 Outpost we published the first version of this article entitled “Putting First Things Last: The 55 Year Failure to Address the Arab Refugee Problem.” The failure is now 61 years old and we felt it was time to say it again: the integration of the refugees into Arab countries is a prerequisite for any meaningful agreement. We published an updated version of our 2003 article on the Family Security Matters website on August 12, 2009. We reprint that article—slightly expanded—because this issue has been neglected by Jewish organizations almost as badly as by diplomats, Middle East experts and the media. If Jewish organizations, each time the issue of settlements was raised, would say “No, the core issue is refugees, with their claimed ‘right of return,’ What are you doing to resettle them in Arab countries?” they could force a shift in the terms of the debate.

The Rogers Plan of 1969, like all subsequent and ill-fated efforts to resolve the Arab-Israel conflict, tabled the issue of the Palestinian "refugees," leaving it for "final status" negotiations. "It is our hope," said the Rogers Plan, "that agreement on the key issues of peace, security, withdrawal and territory will create a climate in which these questions of refugees...can be resolved as part of the overall settlement."

But this is to put first things last. As the passage of time has made abundantly clear, the issue of "refugees" remains the defining obstacle to any reconciliation in the region. Pretending to negotiate, without addressing this issue at the outset, is like operating on a patient and leaving a growing cancer intact. Had it been confronted in 1949, the prospects for finding a subsequent modus vivendi between Israel and the Arabs would have been vastly improved.

President Obama has promised a fresh perspective on issues, to bring "change" in the old ways of doing things. There is no better place to start than by confronting the core issue of the Arab refugees head on—and putting responsibility for solving it on the only ones who can do so, the Arab states.

When the problem of the Arab refugees was at last put on the table at Camp David in the year 2000, the issue blew up the tattered remnant of the Oslo "peace process." Then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak thought he had a winning formula. Israel would make a virtually total territorial withdrawal to the 1949 armistice lines. In return, all that would be asked of the Palestinian Authority was to abandon the "right to return," i.e. to eliminate, via demography, the Jewish state. If the Arab-Israel conflict was susceptible to solution via "land for peace," Barak should have had a deal. But Arafat refused to give up the "right to return" and launched outright war, including the most deadly series of terrorist attacks in Israel's history.

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Love of the Land: Putting First Things First-Sovling The Arab Refugee Problem

Love of the Land: The Myth of Israeli Power

The Myth of Israeli Power

FresnoZionism.com
06 September 09

Recently I was talking with someone who favors direct negotiations between Israel and Hamas. He said that Israel could afford to do this because Israel was so much stronger than Hamas. On another occasion, it was suggested that Israel could afford to withdraw from all the territories and meet all the demands (even accept Arab refugees) of the PA in the name of peace, because “Israel is as powerful as NATO”.

In both cases my discussion partners were ignoring two salient points: the very real external and internal constraints on the use of Israel’s formidable military power, and the physical and societalvulnerability of Israel.

It’s been said (OK, I just said it) that in recent history Israel has often had all of its enemies’ ducks in a row but then was not allowed to pull the trigger.

For example, in 1956 an angry Eisenhower forced Israel to withdraw after successfully capturing the Sinai peninsula and the Gaza strip. In 1973, Israel was forced by threats from the Soviets and US pressure to allow the surrounded Egyptian Third Army to escape destruction. In 1982, Yasser Arafat and his PLO men were allowed to flee to exile in Tunis under the protection of a multilateral force. Supposedly an Israeli sniper had Arafat in his sights but was not permitted to fire; one wonders if an Oslo process could have brought peace had he done so. And of course in 1991, Israel absorbed scud missile attacks from Saddam’s Iraq because the first President Bush did not allow Israel to use her power in self-defense.

In January of this year, then-Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni flew to Washington while the IDF was awaiting orders to begin the third phase of Operation Cast Lead, the entry into Gaza city which would bring about the capture or death of the Hamas leadership and its destruction as a fighting force. She returned with a near-meaningless memorandum of understanding, and shortly thereafter Israel began to withdraw from Gaza without executing Phase III. The IDF was out of Gaza before Barack Obama’s inauguration, and although it was not publicly admitted by Israel or the US, many observers think that Livni received an ultimatum to this effect.

Internal constraints also affect the exercise of Israeli military power. Israel could have completely wiped out Hamas in Gaza with a combination of aerial attacks and artillery fire, in a matter of days and before international pressure could be marshaled to prevent it. This could have been done with almost no risk to IDF personnel, just as the Russians did in Grozny, Chechnya. But no Israeli government — or the Israeli populace — would have been able to accept the thousands or tens of thousands of Palestinian civilian deaths that would result from it.

I can also mention Israel’s nuclear deterrent here. Unlike some other nuclear powers, Israel has never used its capability to threaten other nations, but has always held it in reserve to deter attacks with weapons of mass destruction or as a last-ditch option if the country is in danger of being overrun (as was feared in 1973).

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Love of the Land: The Myth of Israeli Power

Love of the Land: Obama’s Dangerous Strategy

Obama’s Dangerous Strategy

melaniephillips.com
Jewish Chronicle
03 September 09

The farce over doorknobs for centrifuges masks the fact that President Obama’s whole Middle East strategy is in the process of imploding.

Obama has been pressuring Israel to freeze every brick and widow-frame of all settlement construction as a precondition for the US ‘getting tough’ with Iran. This has caused Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu to walk a diplomatic tightrope. But it is arguably President Obama who has the rope around his own neck.

Israel’s supposed policy of expanding the settlements has been presented as the major stumbling-block to peace with the Palestinians and Arab support against Iran. This was absurd, and indeed Obama is now softening his stance.

Construction of new settlements has been frozen for years with no concessions from the Palestinian side. And the idea that Israeli concessions were needed to bring the Arabs on side against Iran was ridiculous. The Arabs are desperate for the Iranian nuclear threat to be removed because Iran is an overwhelming threat to their existence.

The settlements are irrelevant to the Iran crisis — which has predictably become even more acute because Obama’s policy of appeasing the Arab and Muslim world has gone belly-up. In response to his hand of friendship, the Iranian regime rigged its election, tortured and murdered its internal opponents and turned even more extreme.

As for Israel, Netanyahu faced down Obama over his attempt to define Jewish houses in east Jerusalem as ’settlements’ and to freeze construction there, too. Having united virtually all of Israel against him (only four per cent of Israelis think Obama is pro-Israel) the US President grovelled to the Arabs for a sign of some move towards peace with Israel. They refused.

He begged the Iranians to ‘engage’ with him. In response, they have now appointed as defence minister Ahmad Vahidi, a terrorist wanted for the 1994 bombing of the Jewish community centre in Buenos Aires and who was also involved in the 2006 bombing of the Khobar Towers complex which killed 19 American soldiers. Meanwhile, Iran continues to develop the nuclear capability which threatens not just Israel but America and Europe.

In any event, Obama has already said that he will get tough with Iran if it remains intransigent by this autumn. So how could the settlement issue have been the clincher?

And what does ‘getting tough’ mean? Why, sanctions. The Iranians must be quaking in their boots. We can all write the script for that debacle already. Talk about shutting the stable door after the centrifuges have bolted.

And then what? When Plan B fails, what is Obama’s Plan C? I think we know. It’s called ‘living with a nuclear Iran’ — or the surrender of the west.

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Love of the Land: Obama’s Dangerous Strategy

Love of the Land: Success: Golan Facebookers Ain't Syrian

Success: Golan Facebookers Ain't Syrian

Backspin/Honest Reporting
07 September 09

Little more than a week ago, HonestReporting launched the Facebook group,Facebook, Golan Residents Live in Israel, not Syria.

This was in response to Facebook settings that only allowed Golan residents to chooseSyria as their home country. But our members got Facebook's attention: last night, we discovered that Facebook changed the settings. The heights are no longer exclusively "Syrian" now. Facebookers in communities like Ramat Magshimim, Geshur, and Had Nes aren't forced to "select" Syria in the dropdown box.

Screen grab before, with Syria as the only option:




Screen grab after, now includes Israel

Credit Facebook for simply making the change without getting dragged into an acrimonious and embarrassing political debate. And credit our 2,490 members for getting involved and getting results.

Be sure to join the ongoing discussion at HonestReporting's Facebook page.

Love of the Land: Success: Golan Facebookers Ain't Syrian

Love of the Land: A Potential Torah University

A Potential Torah University

Judy Siegel-Itzkovich
JPost
05 September 09

When the visionary, Vienna-born physicist Prof. Ze'ev Lev (William Low) established the Jerusalem College of Technology (JCT) 40 years ago with seven engineering students in an apartment building in the Bayit Vegan quarter, he dreamed of the day when there would be 400 or 500 students. Those familiar with his dream of teaching high-level science and engineering combined with Torah to modern Orthodox and haredi men doubt that Lev actually believed such a goal could be reached.

Lev somehow foresaw that this combination was exactly what 21st-century Jerusalem would need to fight the decline in the number of modern Orthodox residents, the high poverty rate, the minimal levels of secular education in haredi families and the capital's need for a strong technological base.

When Lev's former physics student at the Hebrew University, Prof. Joseph Bodenheimer, was named JCT's fourth president 16 years ago, that target had already been achieved, with 440 students in six buildings on the Givat Mordechai campus. Today, as he hands over the president's chair to eminent French-born mathematician Prof. Noah Dana-Picard, there are 3,000 students on campuses in Jerusalem and Ramat Gan, and 17 buildings on the main Givat Mordechai campus alone.

WHEN I interviewed him in 1993 upon his promotion from JCT rector to president (as I have interviewed the three presidents before him), I was impressed to find Bodenheimer sitting in the secretary's room rather than that of his predecessor, Dr. Yitzhak Nebenzahl (who needed the larger room due to a physical disability). Bodenheimer explained that the very pinched financial situation of the college required the president to serve as an example of modesty, so he remained in the small room, with its simple office furniture, for 16 years. "It is very satisfying when a new student tells me that his father studied here," he says.

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Love of the Land: A Potential Torah University

Love of the Land: Netanyahu, It's Time For a Change of Tack

Netanyahu, It's Time For a Change of Tack

Frimet Roth
JPost
07 September 09

Once again, hope for the return of kidnapped soldier Gilad Schalit was raised and then dashed within days. The familiar roller coaster invites the question: Why have our leaders failed to free Schalit?

This year several high-profile missions were carried out to rescue Western hostages. Their success could be instructive for Israel. First, Ingrid Betancourt, a Colombian politician, was freed along with 14 other hostages from jungle captivity in July 2008 in a daring, Hollywoodesque infiltration of guerrilla camps.

Then, on August 5, 2009, former US president Bill Clinton's visit to North Korea scored the surprise release of two American journalists who had been sentenced to 12 years' hard labor by a Pyongyang court. The women were whisked to freedom with Clinton only 20 hours after he landed there.

Next, on August 16, 2009, a visit by US Senator Jim Webb of Virginia to Myanmar secured the return of an American imprisoned there.

Elation over these homecomings has been tempered by concern over the ramifications of the deals cut. As an Associated Press report put it: "Such visits, argue experts, can give regime leaders an aura of respect and recognition that may make it harder for the US to press for sanctions or continue isolation policies aimed at forcing change in everything from humans rights to nuclear power."

ISRAEL IS primed to pay astronomically more for Gilad Schalit. Yet our leaders are indifferent to the deadly ramifications. The release of mass murderers in return for Schalit's freedom poses an irrefutable risk. Yet for three years it has been touted as the single option available.

The day after Schalit's disappearance, his kidnappers offered information about him if Israel agreed to release all female and under-18-year-old Palestinian prisoners.

Since then, while the list of prisoners has grown, no other avenue of rescue has ever been shown, let alone rumored, to be on the cards. Not even the massive Operation Cast Lead produced evidence of any rescue attempt.

Instead, Hamas has been sitting pretty all these years. The only pressure exerted on it has been to delete several prisoners from its list and to approve the exile of several others after release. Moreover, the sine qua non of any deal, the release of all female prisoners, has never been challenged. It is accepted by all as a compassionate stipulation.

One of those women is Ahlam Tamimi. This journalist-cum-university student was involved in the reconnaissance and planning of the August 9, 2001 terror attack on Jerusalem's Sbarro restaurant.

That morning, Tamimi, along with a suicide bomber and 10 kg of explosives, took a taxi from Ramallah. At the checkpoint between east and west Jerusalem, her accomplice, Izzadin al-Masri, got out and walked past the IDF soldiers empty-handed. Tamimi remained in the taxi, passing through unsearched, while the explosives lay beside her.

Once past the checkpoint, Tamimi rejoined Masri on foot. The pair then walked toward the center of Jerusalem. Tamimi carried a camera and the two conversed aloud in English to pass for tourists.

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Love of the Land: Netanyahu, It's Time For a Change of Tack

Love of the Land: School Bells and Rocket Sirens

School Bells and Rocket Sirens

Anav Silverman
IsraelNationalNews.com
04 September 09

Although the third Hamas-Israel ceasefire is still in effect, Sderot schoolchildren began the 2009 school year both excited and yet apprehensive.

Two days before the doors to Sderot's nine schools opened, two rockets fired from Gaza triggered the city's rocket warning system known as the Color Red siren, and sent residents racing for a shelter on Sunday evening, August 30.

"I was scared but not surprised," says Rotem, a 16-year-old Sderot student, beginning eleventh grade at a local Sderot high school. "We know that the rocket attacks will begin again and I don't think that anyone here really believes that the quiet will last. We've lived here [in Sderot] long enough to know that," she says. Although the third Hamas-Israel ceasefire is still in effect, Sderot schoolchildren began the 2009 school year both excited and yet apprehensive.

Two days before the doors to Sderot's nine schools opened, two rockets fired from Gaza triggered the city's rocket warning system known as the Color Red siren, and sent residents racing for a shelter on Sunday evening, August 30.

"I was scared but not surprised," says Rotem, a 16-year-old Sderot student, beginning eleventh grade at a local Sderot high school. "We know that the rocket attacks will begin again and I don't think that anyone here really believes that the quiet will last. We've lived here [in Sderot] long enough to know that," she says.

Dina Huri, principal of a Sderot elementary school, made sure that the opening school year would offer everything for her first to sixth grade students and that also included upgrading the school shelters against future rocket attacks.

"During the summer, I had the 3 school bomb shelters transformed into "kid-friendly" shelters," she says. Huri had the shelter painted in bright colors and installed rugs so that the children would feel more comfortable. Huri doesn't remember the exact date of when the shelters were first installed-- "they have been around for a while"--but she says that the original concrete grey slabs made children feel like they were imprisoned. "Last year, every time the siren blared, the students had to run into these concrete structures, wondering when they could leave. Now these shelters are places that the students want to play in."

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Love of the Land: School Bells and Rocket Sirens

Love of the Land: Wishing It Were So

Wishing It Were So

Noah Pollak

Contentions/Commentary

06 September 09

Sheera Frenkel is an American who works for the UK Times in its dubious Jerusalem bureau, which has a great deal of trouble distinguishing truth from fiction. Her current piece, linked on Drudge, provides a nice example of how Frenkel and her employer view the sensationalization of the Middle East as one of their main jobs. The report is entitled “US fury as Israel defies settlement freeze call,” and in case the point wasn’t made clear by the title, the piece goes on to declare that

Israeli plans to authorise the construction of hundreds of houses in the occupied West Bank sparked furious protests from American and Palestinian officials yesterday.

“Fury” and “furious protests” from the Obama administration? I hadn’t seen them mentioned anywhere else. The dictionary says that furious means “full of or characterized by extreme anger; raging.” What was the American reaction? Right there, a few paragraphs down in Frenkel’s own story, we read that:

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Love of the Land: Wishing It Were So

A Sham and a Shame

A Sham and a Shame

Regular readers don't need me to elaborate much about the decision to build 455 new homes in six settlements just before starting a construction freeze. The whole thing is a sham. Obama started with a reasonable postition that enlarging settlements while negotiating their dismantling is not helpful. So he demanded that not happen. Netanyahu's government could have accepted his position, though one hopes they'd have demanded a reciprocal requirement from the Palestinians - a demand they not teach children Israel shouldn't exist, or some such. The Obama team, however, perhaps in their haste to distance themselves from the Bush administration, demanded the cessation of construction also in places Israel isn't going to dismantle, thereby encouraging the Palestinians to halt the negotiations they themselves had been intensively engaged in. Netanyahu won't, and indeed shouldn't, buckle on this one, so it seems there is now a fudge. There were plans for constuction of 455 homes in the pipeline; these have now been authorised. There aren't any additional plans at the moment, so tomorrow or next week Netanyahu will declare a freeze. Should the negotiations go well, everyone will agree that Modi'in Illit and Har Gilo remain in Israel, and construction will continue when new plans make their way thru the zoning process. If not, there won't be much reason to halt construction, will there. So it's a sham.

And also a shame. We've got this exciting new American administration, or anyway, we had for a moment. Peace in the Middle East is probably beyond the ability of any American administration to deliver, as is peace in Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Congo, Sudan, Nigeria, the Caucasus, and diverse other places; still, it would have been nice to have a real stab at it, and not the silly gesture-politics we've been having the past few months.

In late summer 2008 I wrote here that Obama's first 18-24 months would be disastrous, but that then he and his team might understand the dynamics of the job and pull their act together. It's still early enough for them to prove me pessimistic. But it doesn't look so yet.

Originally posted by Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

Addiction and Free Choice

Posted by Mordechai Friedfertig at 8:56 PM

06

Sep

2009

[From "Maayanei Ha-Yeshua" – Parashat Ki Tetze 5769]

Concern: My name is Rivka. I have experienced extremely hard times, including the loss of a loved one. I now have a terrible addiction, which I do not want to detail. I have been to all types of treatments, but they have not helped. I am not sure I even have any hope. I am completely in despair.
Answer: The common denominator of all types of treatments for addictions, such as for drugs, alcohol or gambling, is that the treatment is not in place of the will to be cured. First and foremost, you must change your outlook on yourself and on life.
Western Culture is a culture of benefit and over-indulgence, i.e. one should give into his inclination whatever they might be. You should change your spiritual direction, and believe in yourself that you have the strength to overcome this inclination, you have free choice and with great effort you can get out of this and return to the light.
Look how much the Torah emphasizes how Rivka Imenu, for whom you were named, received a distorted education from all direction: her father, brother, and locale – and she was able to escape it. Betuel (her father) was a murderer and tried to poison Eliezer (Targum Yonatan on Bereshit 24:33). Lavan was a murderer and wanted to murder Yaakov Avinu (Midrash Ha-Gadol on Bereshit 31:22). Both of them were idol worshippers (Rashi on Ber, 24:31, 31:19). And Lavan had chutzpa to speak before his father (Rashi on Bereshit 24:50). Lavan was greedy and when he saw the jewelry which Eliezer brought, he ran to his father (Bereshit 24:30 with Rashi). Lavan was called "Doubly Evil" (Sanhedrin 105a).
In contrast, Rivka was completely kind (Rashi on Bereshit 24:14), modest, and pure.
This teaches you that there is free choice. It is possible to free yourself from the evil inclination and to climb higher. This is unlike the expression of weakness in Western Culture: "This is how I am. Accept me for me." Look at the determination of Rivka: "And they called Rivka and asked her: Do you want to go with this man (Eliezer)? And she said: "I will go!" (Bereshit 24:28) – Even if you don't want me to go (Rashi).
It is true that a person lives with a body and he is limited by it but the soul is always free. It is an unparalleled Divine wonder. We have the power to overcome all obstacles.
Be strong and courageous.

Originally posted by Torat HaRav Aviner

DoubleTapper: Unemployment in Israel at lower than average

DoubleTapper: Unemployment in Israel at lower than average

RubinReports: Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

By Barry Rubin

The AP reporter’s voice shows she’s very young and her choice of words show she’s very inexperienced. “What do you think,” she asks me, “about the crisis between Europe and Israel.”

Crisis? Well most immediately this is the kind of “crisis” you want, over a very narrow issue—construction on settlements—which can be easily resolved. The Europeans are supporting U.S. efforts, U.S. policy has become a lot more positive on this issue in recent weeks, and some resolution will soon be found.

The resolution will soon be found because President Barack Obama needs one. In the pattern so often repeated by this administration he has put himself in a corner. If he is going to look “good” at the UN session, feel he has a basis for raising sanctions on Iran, and broker an Israel-Palestinian Authority meeting he has to solve this issue of construction. Right now, he needs a resolution far more than does Israel.

This administration has a genius for putting itself into the weaker position on any international issue.

It’s funny, though, how European governments always find some reason to be annoyed and threatening pressure on Israel but never ever on the Palestinians. Have you noticed that? Massive corruption, incitement to violence, letting terrorists go or never arresting them in the first place, violating commitments, none of its seems to matter.

So European governments have an interesting choice: Is their main goal to be “pro-Palestinian” (if condemning a people to decades of conflict by supporting their intransigence can be called supporting them) or seeking Israel-Palestinian peace?

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RubinReports: Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

RubinReports: How Not to Moderate Radicals: The UK, Libya, Prisoner Releases, and Oil Deals

How Not to Moderate Radicals: The UK, Libya, Prisoner Releases, and Oil Deals

By Barry Rubin

The scandal of Britain releasing a Libyan terrorist who helped kill 270 people in the Lockerbie bombing in exchange for an oil deal continues to build. But I want to focus on some details of the issue that shed light on…well, just about everything concerning Western relations with the Middle East.

First, in a damaging interview, UK Justice Minister Jack Straw admitted that the oil deal was “a very big part” of the prisoner deal. This in itself is shocking. Straw is known for being too free with his mouth and this time opened it large enough for his foot to enter firmly therein.

The interesting part is how Straw justifies such behavior:

“I’m unapologetic about that... Libya was a rogue state. “We wanted to bring it back into the fold. And yes, that included trade because trade is an essential part of it and subsequently there was the BP [British Petroleum] deal.”

Of course, we know that what goes on with trade—and this applies to Syria, Iran, and other “rogue” states is not to make moderation but to make money. But here are the other problems.

First, Libya, of course, is still an extremist state. . So the “moderation” through concession policy has failed repeatedly.

Only in the last week dictator Muammar Qadhafi blamed Israel for all the woes of the Africa continent and threatened Switzerland because it dare send police when his visiting son beat up two servants.

Second, regarding Switzerland, that country backed down on the incident in the face of Libyan demands. Surrender and concession is also a big part of the “moderation” strategy. But in the context of Middle Eastern social psychology and political culture, such behavior only emboldens the radicals, which is also what’s happening. And this leads naturally to the next point.

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RubinReports: How Not to Moderate Radicals: The UK, Libya, Prisoner Releases, and Oil Deals

Ministers Accept Settlement Freeze - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

Ministers Accept Settlement Freeze - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

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Israel-Based Journalist Brings Down Radical Obama Official - Politics & Government - Israel News - Israel National News

Israel-Based Journalist Brings Down Radical Obama Official - Politics & Government - Israel News - Israel National News

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Harish to Become Hareidi-Religious City? - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

Harish to Become Hareidi-Religious City? - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

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Bnei Akiva Welcomed to Israel - Jewish World - Israel News - Israel National News

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Love of the Land: This Is Our Place, So Mind Your Manners

This Is Our Place, So Mind Your Manners

Cherna Moskowitz
JPost
06 September 09

When my husband Irving was a young man he would go door-to-door around Milwaukee with a Jewish National Fund blue box collecting money to redeem property in the Land of Israel. Although it was during the Depression, everyone put in what they could afford: pennies, nickels and dimes.

In the 19th century, wealthy Jews like Rothschild were purchasing large tracts of land for Jews to settle in the Holy Land. The synagogue Ohel Yitzhak in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City, abandoned in 1938 after waves of Arab violence - which we recently rebuilt - was originally built and paid for by European Jews in the 1880s. For thousands of years Jews dreamed of Israel and in the last centuries all Jews took part in the effort to reclaim the land and support Jews who lived there.

THIS IS a part of the Jewish tradition: charity for the poor and reclaiming the land of our country. It was perfectly normal for Irving and me to continue to fulfill these mitzvot. It was the driving force behind Irving's quest to work hard to continue the tradition.

How did this become world news, fodder for riots and outraged pronouncements from foreign leaders?

We were both born in the United States and experienced anti-Semitism while growing up. However, we were secure in the knowledge that our government would ensure our equal rights to live in any neighborhood in any part of the country we wished. We believed that if it was legal, the full force of the government would protect us regardless of the fact that we were Jews.

How is it then, that President Barack Obama demands that the Israeli government disallow the Shepherd Hotel a building permit because Jews would live there? Christians and Muslims yes, Jews no. This is clearly racist. Furthermore, this would deprive us as American citizens of our constitutional rights to equal protection of the law.

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Love of the Land: This Is Our Place, So Mind Your Manners

Love of the Land: Ashraf Khalil Can't Swallow Reality

Ashraf Khalil Can't Swallow Reality

Snapshots

A CAMERA Blog
06 September 09

Ashraf Khalil, who reported for the Los Angeles Times from the Gaza Strip during last winter's fighting, explores a worthwhile subject -- Egyptian-Israel relations -- in an Op-Ed in the Jerusalem Post. Yet, he cannot bring himself to acknowledge a basic reality -- that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. He writes:

It's becoming harder for Cairo to hide the fact that its foreign policy interests are more in line with Tel Aviv than ever.

Although an important Ministry of Defense facility is located in Tel Aviv, Israel's seat of government is in Jerusalem --whether or not Ashraf Khalil likes it. Khalil must feel right at home at the Los Angeles Times, which in the past has stood by other writers who likewise referred to Tel Aviv as Israel's capital.

Love of the Land: Ashraf Khalil Can't Swallow Reality

Israel Matzav: Iran claims to have developed stealth missile interceptor

Israel Matzav: Iran claims to have developed stealth missile interceptor

Israel Matzav: Arab League threatens countries that normalize ties with Israel

Israel Matzav: Arab League threatens countries that normalize ties with Israel

Israel Matzav: Are there any Democrats you like?

Israel Matzav: Are there any Democrats you like?

Israel Matzav: Surprise: 'Palestinians' latch onto Aftonbladet blood libel

Israel Matzav: Surprise: 'Palestinians' latch onto Aftonbladet blood libel

Israel Matzav: Gun toting rabbis

Israel Matzav: Gun toting rabbis

Israel Matzav: Why are Jews liberals

Israel Matzav: Why are Jews liberals

Israel Matzav: Poll: US support for Israel jumps since Obama speech

Israel Matzav: Poll: US support for Israel jumps since Obama speech

Israel Matzav: Cabinet approves Judea and Samaria building permits

Israel Matzav: Cabinet approves Judea and Samaria building permits

Israel Matzav: IDF: Ron Arad died in Lebanon in mid-90's

Israel Matzav: IDF: Ron Arad died in Lebanon in mid-90's

Israel Matzav: Hamas commander threatens to harm Shalit if brother not released

Israel Matzav: Hamas commander threatens to harm Shalit if brother not released

Israel Matzav: The only incentive for peace

Israel Matzav: The only incentive for peace

Israel Matzav: 'Our friends the Saudis': 'Israeli planes flying over would contaminate holy cities'

Israel Matzav: 'Our friends the Saudis': 'Israeli planes flying over would contaminate holy cities'

Israel Matzav: Likud MK's to oppose freeze despite extra permits

Israel Matzav: Likud MK's to oppose freeze despite extra permits

Israel Matzav: Arabs moving into Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem

Arabs moving into Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem

I warned as far back as 2006 that Arabs were moving into Jewish neighborhoods on the edge between the Jewish and Arab parts of the city - neighborhoods like Pisgat Zev and French Hill. Of course, you won't hear any outcry about it from the US or the EU. No pious platitudes about how they're predetermining the outcome of 'negotiations.' No complaints about how they're changing the city's demographics. I leave it to the reader to decide why.

It wasn't so much the politics of this contested city that drew Majlaton to Pisgat Zeev, however; it was the prospect of escaping the potholed roads and scant municipal services he endured for 19 years while renting in an Arab neighborhood.

"You see that air conditioner?" he said, pointing to the large wall unit cooling his living room. "In the Arab areas, the electricity is too weak to run one that big."

Majlaton, 50, says some Jewish neighbors are warming up to him, but the influx bothers others, who say they're thinking of moving out or refuse to sell or rent to Arabs.

This is much more than a simple matter of real estate. Demographics could figure heavily in how Jerusalem is partitioned in a future peace deal. If that happens, it is expected the city will be split along ethnic lines - Jewish neighborhoods to Israel, Arab neighborhoods to Palestine.

...

In 2007, the latest year with available statistics, about 1,300 of Pisgat Zeev's 42,000 residents were Arabs. In nearby French Hill, population 7,000, nearly one-sixth are Arabs, among them students at the neighboring Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Neve Yaakov, with 20,000 people, had 600 Arabs, according to the Israel Center for Jerusalem Studies, a respected think tank.

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Israel Matzav: Arabs moving into Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem

Hamas Training Camps in the Judean Desert - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

Hamas Training Camps in the Judean Desert - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

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New American Poll: Support Israel, Blame Hamas - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

New American Poll: Support Israel, Blame Hamas - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

Shared via AddThis

New Iranian Defense Minister is Suspected Terrorist, Gloats - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

New Iranian Defense Minister is Suspected Terrorist, Gloats - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

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London Mayor Recommends Ramadan Fast for All - Politics & Government - Israel News - Israel National News

London Mayor Recommends Ramadan Fast for All - Politics & Government - Israel News - Israel National News

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Hareidi-Religious Join Outpost Struggle - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

Hareidi-Religious Join Outpost Struggle - Inside Israel - Israel News - Israel National News

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IDF Chief Counsel: International Law is 'Sacred' - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

IDF Chief Counsel: International Law is 'Sacred' - Defense/Middle East - Israel News - Israel National News

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Love of the Land: The Schoenau Ultimatum

The Schoenau Ultimatum

Yehuda Avner

JPost
03 September 09

How does one treat terrorists? Deal with them and you're done for; don't and innocents die. Take the case of Schoenau. It is a tale of infamy that seized the assemblage of the Council of Europe in September 1973.

The Council of Europe in Strasbourg is that continent's approximation to a representative house. At the time in question, its 400-odd delegates watched with various degrees of curiosity as a stooped, aging woman with a face deeply scarred with tragic lines mounted the podium. She was prime minister Golda Meir, and she was there at the invitation of the European Council to state the case for Israel.

Generally speaking, Golda Meir preferred to speak extemporaneously, but since this was a formal occasion, protocol required she deliver a pre-prepared address. I, her in-house speechwriter, drafted one. In its preparation I had torn up a dozen or more versions, leaving tooth marks on my pen as I wrote and rewrote page after page, scribbling deranged doodles while mentally struggling for concise, rhythmic, salvationary nouns and alliterative descriptions in my effort to give her words a defining oratory.

Finally, a coherent theme emerged and a speech surfaced. It thanked the council and individual European parliaments for raising their voices in support of Soviet Jewry's right to freely emigrate to Israel (this was at the height of the worldwide "Let My People Go" campaign), delved into the intricacies of the Middle East conflict, pleaded for "the European Council's help to enable the Middle East to emulate the model of peaceful coexistence that the council itself had established," and perorated with a quote from the great European statesman Jean Monnet, that "peace depends not only on treaties and promises. It depends essentially upon the creation of conditions which, if they do not change the nature of men, at least guide their behavior towards each other in a peaceful direction."

To my consternation Golda never enunciated a single one of these words. Instead, she scanned the assembly from end to end, jaw jutting, her expression defiant, and after combing back her hair with the fingers of both hands, brandished the written speech, and in a caustic tone said, "I have here my prepared address, a copy of which I believe you have before you. But I have decided at the last minute not to place between you and me the paper on which my speech is written. Instead, you will forgive me if I break with protocol and speak in an impromptu fashion. I say this in light of what has occurred in Austria during the last few days."

CLEARLY, THE woman had decided it was idiotic to read her formal address after the devastating news which had reached her just before leaving Israel for Strasbourg: A train carrying Jews from communist Russia en route to Israel via Vienna was hijacked by two Arab terrorists at a railway crossing on the Austrian frontier. Seven Jews were taken hostage, among them a 73-year-old man, an ailing woman and a three-year-old child. The terrorists issued an ultimatum that unless the Austrian government instantly closed down Schoenau, the Jewish Agency's layover near Vienna where the émigrés were processed before being flown on to Israel, not only would the hostages be killed, but Austria itself would become the target of violent retaliation.

The Austrian cabinet hastily met and, led by chancellor Bruno Kreisky, capitulated. Kreisky announced that Schoenau would be closed forthwith, and the terrorists were hustled to the airport for safe passage to Libya.

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Love of the Land: The Schoenau Ultimatum

Love of the Land: Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

Barry Rubin

The Rubin Report

06 September 09

The AP reporter’s voice shows she’s very young and her choice of words show she’s very inexperienced. “What do you think,” she asks me, “about the crisis between Europe and Israel.”

Crisis? Well most immediately this is the kind of “crisis” you want, over a very narrow issue—construction on settlements—which can be easily resolved. The Europeans are supporting U.S. efforts, U.S. policy has become a lot more positive on this issue in recent weeks, and some resolution will soon be found.

The resolution will soon be found because President Barack Obama needs one. In the pattern so often repeated by this administration he has put himself in a corner. If he is going to look “good” at the UN session, feel he has a basis for raising sanctions on Iran, and broker an Israel-Palestinian Authority meeting he has to solve this issue of construction. Right now, he needs a resolution far more than does Israel.

This administration has a genius for putting itself into the weaker position on any international issue.

It’s funny, though, how European governments always find some reason to be annoyed and threatening pressure on Israel but never ever on the Palestinians. Have you noticed that? Massive corruption, incitement to violence, letting terrorists go or never arresting them in the first place, violating commitments, none of its seems to matter.

So European governments have an interesting choice: Is their main goal to be “pro-Palestinian” (if condemning a people to decades of conflict by supporting their intransigence can be called supporting them) or seeking Israel-Palestinian peace?

The answer in most cases—all countries are different—is the former. Being “pro-Palestinian” makes them look “progressive” and “humanitarian,” supposedly scores points in the Arab and Muslim world, theoretically promotes trade and investment with the aforementioned places, and so on.

Also, if European leaders believe—some do, some don’t—that there isn’t going to be peace (even if they privately blame the Palestinians) this policy can seem to make sense for their interests.
Israel’s problem is not predominantly with the European masses or even, to a lesser extent, with governments, but with the European intellectual elites. After all, take the four main countries of Europe: France, Germany, Italy, and the UK.

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Love of the Land: Crisis in Israel-Europe Relations?

Esser Agaroth: How To Get Deeper Into Torah Without Going Off The Deep End

Esser Agaroth: How To Get Deeper Into Torah Without Going Off The Deep End

Esser Agaroth: Top Ten Words and Phrases of תשס"ט/5769

Esser Agaroth: Top Ten Words and Phrases of תשס"ט/5769

Love of the Land: AP Wrong on Jewish Quarter

AP Wrong on Jewish Quarter

Snapshots
A CAMERA Blog
06 September 09

In a fascinating article about Arabs moving into Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem, AP's Ben Hubbard incorrectly writes that "the Old City's Jewish Quarter is closed to Arabs." In fact, Arabs can and do live in the Jewish Quarter. As noted earlier by CAMERA's Alex Safian:

According to the most recent figures available online (from the 1995 Census of Population and Housing) at least 480 Muslims lived in the Jewish Quarter, making up 22.5% of the quarter’s population. In contrast, Jews made up just 1.68% of the Muslim Quarter’s population. Even in absolute terms, the 480 Muslims living in the Jewish Quarter outnumbered the 380 Jews living in the much larger Muslim Quarter. (The Jerusalem Statistical Yearbook gives the total population of the quarters, along with their numerical designation – the Jewish Quarter is Sub-quarter 63 of Jerusalem, the Muslim Quarter Sub-quarter 64. The Census of Population and Housing then gives the religious breakdown of the population by sub-quarter and even by the more detailed measure of statistical area; the relevant figures are on and near line 1639 of this spreadsheet.

Love of the Land: AP Wrong on Jewish Quarter

Love of the Land: Holy City Twist: Arabs Moving Into Jewish Areas

Holy City Twist: Arabs Moving Into Jewish Areas

By Ben Hubbard
The Associated Press
06 September 09

(While somewhat long it's important to get to the punchline at the end)

JERUSALEM -- Yousef Majlaton moved into the Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Zeev for such comforts as proper running water and regular garbage pickup. But he represents a potentially volatile twist in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute over the holy city.

The hillside sprawl of townhouses and apartment blocks was built for Jews, and Majlaton is a Palestinian.

Pisgat Zeev is part of Israel's effort to fortify its presence in Jerusalem's eastern half which it captured in the 1967 war.

But Majlaton, his wife and three kids are among thousands who have crossed the housing lines to Pisgat Zeev and neighborhoods like it in a migration that is raising tempers among some Jewish residents.

It wasn't so much the politics of this contested city that drew Majlaton to Pisgat Zeev, however; it was the prospect of escaping the potholed roads and scant municipal services he endured for 19 years while renting in an Arab neighborhood.

"You see that air conditioner?" he said, pointing to the large wall unit cooling his living room. "In the Arab areas, the electricity is too weak to run one that big."

Majlaton, 50, says some Jewish neighbors are warming up to him, but the influx bothers others, who say they're thinking of moving out or refuse to sell or rent to Arabs.

This is much more than a simple matter of real estate. Demographics could figure heavily in how Jerusalem is partitioned in a future peace deal. If that happens, it is expected the city will be split along ethnic lines - Jewish neighborhoods to Israel, Arab neighborhoods to Palestine.

Palestinians see east Jerusalem as their future capital. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vows the whole city will remain united as Israel's capital.

Palestinians have long accused those among them who sell land to Jews of betraying their homeland, and last week similar language was heard from a group of rabbis. Meeting in Pisgat Zeev, they issued an edict denouncing Jews who sell land to Arabs as "traitors" and barring them from participating in communal prayers.

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Love of the Land: Holy City Twist: Arabs Moving Into Jewish Areas

Love of the Land: End the Incitement

End the Incitement

14 March 2007

At the time of this writing Israel's lackluster PM and the PA's irrelevant President are trying to prop each other up. The topic they've discussed is supposedly peace. But the only path to peace is through an end to incitement. And that's one item that I'm sure was not on their agenda.

For more info and links, check this previous posting about Incitement and the Peace Process

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Love of the Land: End the Incitement

To be a Serious Army in Our Land

To be a Serious Army in Our Land

Posted by Mordechai Friedfertig at 5:11 AM

06

Sep

2009

["Be-Ahavah U-Be-Emunah" – Ki Tavo 5769 – translated by R. Blumberg]

1. To remain in the exile and to imagine that we will not be hurt by assimilation and pogroms constitutes silliness and irresponsibility. I am not saying this to make an accusation, but only to express sorrow.

Yet to return to our land and to rebuild it, to establish our state, economy and army -- that constitutes taking a serious, responsible approach.

2. To sit complacently in our land and to imagine that we no longer have enemies, that we are living in a New Middle East in which there is no more war, only a few guerrila forces, and that in exchange for conceding a third or two thirds of our land, our neighbors will make peace with us, that we have almost no need of reserve duty, that we have almost no need of emergency warehouses -- that constitutes irresponsibility and worse. I am not trying to cast blame, only to arouse the public.

Yet to dispel illusions, to understand with a realistic, courageous perspective that we still have stubborn enemies, that the appeasing outlook of Chamberlain who said, "Peace, and no more war," is a mistake that led to the Second World War, to realize that Churchill answered him, "Your kind of peace is followed by war, and my war will be followed by peace" -- that is the serious spirit of the human race.

3. To conceive a new doctrine, that against terrorists you needn't use all your weaponry, bombs and tanks, but should be gentle; to think that certainly you shouldn't harm those arbitrarily defined as "innocent," for you have to be concerned about their welfare, and even targeted killings of terrorists aren't nice because it isn't good and proper to punish a person without first trying him in court – to think all this and thereby to lead our loyal soldiers, fighting like lions, to their deaths, and to evacuate from their homes a million and a half faithful citizens -- that constitutes silliness, an academic ivory tower on some other planet. My purpose is not to attack, but only to illuminate.

Yet a strong army that is always ready to smite the Arab wolves who come to annihilate us, an army that advocates "total war" in order to save us and our wives and children -- that is seriousness. That is responsibility. That is sanity.

4. To foster a national fantasy of transforming our army into an effeminate army, a maternal army, an army in which no one is endangered, an army in which one neither kills nor is killed, a luft-army, a show-case army, an army of peace, a shlemiel army -- is self-delusion. It is silly. I am not trying to accuse, only to improve.

Yet to recognize that we emerged from our exile and our lowliness of spirit, that we were saved from some sort of bizarre masochism -- that is morality, that is naturalness, that is healthiness! To absorb from the spirit of the university, science and technology, economics and organization, yet to draw our spiritual values and worldview from the depths of the life of our people rising to rebirth -- that is a proper, serious perspective on reality. To realize, with pain and fortitude, that armies and wars involve killing and being killed, that when we are not ready to be killed, quite the contrary, even more are killed, and when we ready to be killed, quite the contrary, much blood is spared; to know that it is impossible to easily heal what was broken and to say, "All is well" -- that is seriousness. That constitutes genuine leadership which contains a vision for which we are ready to pay a price.

Originally posted by Torat HaRav Aviner

Spooks Galore

Spooks Galore

I'm not certain we'll ever know the full story here, but the idea the Israelis wre collaborating with the Russians against the other Russians against the Arctic Sea in the English Channel is as plausible as any version of the murky story so far offered.

taken from Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

The Staying Power of American Jews

The Staying Power of American Jews

The section of the Bava Batra tractate we covered last week spent more than two double pages discussing various aspects of tsedaka, which is sort of a cross between charity, alms-giving, and philanthropy. (No, they're not all the same - and see also the previous post). At one point the discussion focuses on the case where a prominent non-Jewish woman sought a scholar to manage a donation for her. R. Ami turned her down, while Rava accepted the charge. The Gemara assumes they both knew the same halachic restrictions and stipulations on non-Jews and Tsedaka, but ultimately it seems the differing decisions were a matter of geopolitics. The woman was the mother of a Persian king. R. Ami, living in Eretz Yisrael under Roman jurisdiction, could turn her down, while Rava, living under the jurisdiction of her son, couldn't. (Bava Batra 10b).

Borrowing this ancient story for a very contemporary topic, it should be clear that American Jews and Israelis may have legitimate differences on many issues, even assuming either community ever had unanimity an anything on its own side. Geography matters today, as it did eighteen hundred years ago.

My question regarding this editorial in The Forward isn't about it's thesis, but about it's unspoken underlying quandary. The thesis is that the Birthright program which flies young American Jews to Israel for 10 fantastic days isn't enough to forge a long-term bond with Israel; the main follow-up program, apparently, looks sort of like an attempt to proselytize to orthodox Judaism, and this must be countered.

Fair enough for what it's worth. Yet isn't the real problem, even as described by the editorial itself, that for most young American Jews, short of orthodox Judaism there isn't much of a program or option that's particularly compelling?

The community is far less adept at effectively reaching out to single, unaffiliated Jews in their 20s, who marry and procreate later than their parents, and enter adulthood at a time of limitless opportunities as Americans, including the opportunity to ignore their faith and live outside the tribe. Worrying though the Jewish Enrichment Center is, it fills a void left by the inability or unwillingness of more progressive denominations to engage in the kind of passionate outreach characteristic of the ultra-Orthodox. This dynamic is played out on college campuses, where students flock to the warmth and welcome (and, let’s be honest, the liquor) offered in a Chabad house on a Friday night rather than the more institutional atmosphere of the local Hillel or synagogue.

I'm not being judgmental. The historical evidence is that Jews have carried on longer than any other known group, in spite of more adverse conditions, because they wanted to. On past evidence, then, they'll probably continue carrying on to the extent they have the willpower. Where the willpower is insufficient, so will the staying power be lacking.

Pervasive indifference of American Jews to their Judaism is regrettable for Israel, but not an existential threat. It may be such a threat to American Jewry.

taken from Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

TSEDAKA

Tsedaka

Rabbi Yehuda says:
Ten elements were created, each more powerful than the next.
Rock is hard, but iron cuts it.
Iron is hard, but fire melts it.
Fire is powerful, but water douses it.
Water is powerful, but clouds carry it.
Clouds are powerful, but wind dissipates them.
Wind is powerful, but living bodies contain it.
The body is strong, but fear breaks it.
Fear is powerful, but wine banishes it.
Wine is powerful, but sleep supersedes it.
And death is more powerful than them all.
Yet tsedaka (charity, good deeds) protects from death, as is said (Proverbs 10 verse 2)
"righteousness delivers from death" [The original Hebrew says Tsedaka, which is not synonymous with righteousness].

Bava Batra, 10a.

This thread began, and is explained, here.

taken from Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations

Love of the Land: All of the Jewish state is “contested ground”

All of the Jewish state is “contested ground”

FresnoZionism.org

04 September 09

JTA reports:

In an open letter in response to a protest by dozens of celebrities protesting the Toronto International Film Festival’s decision to showcase the city of Tel Aviv, festival co-director Cameron Bailey wrote that spotlighting Tel Aviv was “not a simple choice and that the city remains contested ground. We continue to learn more about the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.”

If the city, which was founded on sand dunes by Jews in 1909, is “contested ground” then everything is. And in truth the existence of every last Jew in Israel is “contested”. This is not a big surprise to anyone who pays attention to what Palestinian Arab leaders of any faction say whenever they are not speaking specifically for Western consumption.

I am sure that Bailey, who does not appear to be particularly political, is “learn[ing] more” about the morally inverted ‘movement’ to isolate Israel. Naomi Klein, one of the leaders of the protest, describes her motivation thus:

Since 2006 Israel has been steadily escalating its criminality: expanding settlements, launching an outrageous war against Lebanon, and imposing collective punishment on Gaza through the brutal blockade.

Klein lives in an alternate universe, where Israel did not (in 2005) dismantle 21 settlements in Gaza and 4 in the West Bank, and evict more than 8,000 Jews (and some Bedouins whom the Palestinian Arabs view as ‘collaborators’). In Klein’s universe, Hezbollah apparently did not invade Israel, killing seven soldiers and firing missiles into Israel, and Hamas did not fire eight thousand Qassam and Katyusha rockets against Sderot and vicinity. This is undoubtedly the version of reality that Bailey is busy ‘learning’.

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Love of the Land: All of the Jewish state is “contested ground”

Israel Matzav: Good news: Carl Bildt is staying home

Good news: Carl Bildt is staying home

This is the best news I've heard tonight. Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt, who has arrogantly refused to express any remorse for the publication of a blood libel by one of his country's tabloids last month, has decided not to come to Israel on September 11 (what an 'appropriate' day that would have been). Good riddance!

While Swedish officials told The Jerusalem Post late last week that the visit was in doubt, Israeli diplomatic officials said Saturday night that the visit had definitely been cancelled.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was considering not meeting Bildt unless he condemned the article in the tabloid Aftonbladet, something the Swedish government - citing freedom of the press - has adamantly refused to do. Netanyahu gave vent to Israel's disappointment over the matter during a meeting last week in Jerusalem with visiting EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

During that meeting, Netanyahu said that no one was expecting the Swedes to restrict freedom of the press, but that it was reasonable to expect the government to speak out against the type of defamation that in the past had led to the mass murder of Jews.

Sweden currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU, and Bildt's failure to visit here will have an impact on the country's ability during its term as president to have any real say on the diplomatic process.

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Israel Matzav: Good news: Carl Bildt is staying home

Israel Matzav: Carter continues to ignore reality

Carter continues to ignore reality

Former US President Jimmy Carter has an op-ed in Sunday's Washington Post describing his recent visit to our region with the arrogantly-named 'Elders' group. The 'Elders' include two other vicious Jew haters who were recently awarded Medals of Freedom by Carter protege Barack Hussein Obama: Mary Robinson and Desmond Tutu. The 'Elders' were ostensibly here to 'support Israelis and Palestinians seeking peace.' As you might imagine, Carter's op-ed is completely without context.

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Israel Matzav: Carter continues to ignore reality

The Torah Revolution: Meretz: to promote the rights of the gay community

The Torah Revolution: Meretz: to promote the rights of the gay community